In many ways, schools act like surrogate parents. They provide nourishment, education and transportation; monitor and correct behaviors; dispense punishment and encouragements, foster physical activity, and give medical care for a number of common injuries and sicknesses.

For the most part, this role is accepted and expected, as when children enter into the schoolhouse, parents should feel that they will be cared for just as well – or maybe even better – as when they are at home.

But schools are no replacement for parents. The institution is unequipped to supplant parents when it comes to sensitive issues, such as sexuality. Although school health officials are valued for their clinical knowledge, this does not mean they should act independently of parents.

Decisions about contraception for sexually-active children, then, cannot be made outside of parental knowledge. On issues sensitive and important to parents, schools should realize their duties as stewards of children, although crucial, is supportive – not primary.

Furor about the Portland School Committee’s decision to allow confidential prescription of contraceptives to middle-schoolers – without parental notification – is about the school transcending boundaries between supporting students, and trying to parent them.

And regardless of the policy’s noble intentions, keeping parents in the dark is a glaring mistake. While the school system acted commendably in recognizing a serious issue – youthful sexual activity – and responding to it, the choice the committee has made in response is wrong.

Schools have a duty to help their students. Schools also have a duty to be accountable to their parents. The contraception policy may have been designed to accomplish the former, but it stumbles badly on the latter. For this reason, the policy should be recalled, reviewed and seriously reworked.

If a child skins a knee or sprains an ankle during school hours, it’s harmless to notify parents, if even merely out of courtesy. Kids will get purplish bruises and reddish scrapes, and schools can no more prevent them than they can stop the sun from rising.

There’s little harm, either, in notifying parents about more serious, less superficial, problems. Troubling mental health symptoms, such as mood swings or hyperactivity, for example. Or admissions of sexual activity, which has great damage potential for a child’s health, far beyond its moralistic corollaries.

Schools are allowed certain freedoms when it comes to students. So are children, who are entrusted to do their schoolwork, study and participate. This freedom is powerful, and parents expect both sides – schools and students – to exercise it judiciously.

This means no secrets between them. Medical confidentiality is an oft-infuriating reality, but dogmatic adherence to a sterile policy is no replacement for common-sense attitudes. Placating parents by professing diligent standards for sexuality counseling and advice is no consolation for being essentially barred from the discussion.

Parents must be included. When asked about middle-school contraception, Lewiston Middle School Principal Maureen LaChappelle told us, if the need arises, “We have the nurse contact the parents.”

How easy. Portland, take note.